


Bacon and Plums

by fauxfillorian



Category: The Magicians (TV), The Magicians - Lev Grossman
Genre: Angst, Grief, Healing, and learning you don't have to do it alone, just a story about doing the best you can
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-14
Updated: 2020-01-14
Packaged: 2021-02-27 04:08:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,194
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22260838
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fauxfillorian/pseuds/fauxfillorian
Summary: Twenty minutes outside Modesto, California is the city of Turlock.Somewhere near the edge of Turlock, at a small, creaky old house, Eliot Waugh crunched up the cobblestone sidewalk and climbed the stairs.The knocker was rusted and the wood door worn and scratched, the flesh peeled back in several places as if the home was abandoned. He knocked once, hard, and then, at the sound of movement inside, he knocked three more times.A curtain twitched, and an audible swear came from the other side of the door.
Relationships: Quentin Coldwater/Alice Quinn, Quentin Coldwater/Eliot Waugh
Kudos: 24





	Bacon and Plums

**Author's Note:**

> Just a couple of magicians doing the best they can...hope you enjoy. *slight canon variations

Twenty minutes outside Modesto, California is the city of Turlock.

Somewhere near the edge of Turlock, at a small, creaky old house, Eliot Waugh crunched up the cobblestone sidewalk and climbed the stairs.

The knocker was rusted and the wood door worn and scratched, the flesh peeled back in several places as if the home was abandoned. He knocked once, hard, and then, at the sound of movement inside, he knocked three more times.

A curtain twitched, an audible swear came from the other side of the door.

“Jesus Christ, Alice,” Eliot huffed and, raising his hand, he cast. Middle finger over index and then over ring finger, his hand rotated left then right slowly, like a thief picking a lock. The door clicked and swung open and there inside stood Alice, nervous and tired looking. Eliot moved to step forward but met an invisible wall. “Lower your wards.”

“Fuck,” she swore and set to work lowering them, taking nearly two minutes in all to drop the plentiful protective and concealing enchantments she’d raised. Finally, she ushered Eliot inside, pressing the door shut after a furtive glance around.

Eliot wandered around the room while she redid the spells. It was scarcely decorated, rustic and flowery, like something put together by a woman several times Alice’s age. There were no traces of Alice anywhere. Not in the décor, not in the atmosphere, not even in the girl stood before him.

For one, she was wearing pants. For another, they were pajama bottoms. Loose frilly things like she didn’t intend on leaving the house for anything any time soon. It was almost sad. Fuck, it was completely sad.

Eliot slipped off his thick black coat and draped it over one of the cleaner looking chairs. Alice finished and turned, leaning against the door.

“What are you doing here?” she asked, pulling at the bottom of her baby blue shirt like she’d just realized how he caught her.

“Better question: what the hell are _you_ doing here?” Eliot shot back.

“I…” she paused and then answered honestly. “I didn’t know where else to go. I thought of Modesto…Not a lot of hedges in Turlock so there’s a bit more ambient magic,” she rambled. “I mostly use it for the wards.” She jabbed a thumb at the door.

“Nice place,” Eliot deadpanned. He patted the arm of a love-seat and the movement kicked up a puff of dust.

“I’m squatting,” Alice told him. “No one owns the deeds to this place so…” she trailed off. There was a taut line between the two growing tighter and tighter still with every word they spoke and every glance they spared. It had a name, this connection between them, and the name tasted sour on their tongues.

“I rigged the utilities. Do you want some tea?” she gestured behind him to the bit of kitchen hiding around the corner. She took off before he answered and her footsteps drew groans from the old floor.

“You got anything stronger?” Eliot wondered. “It was a long trip.”

He sat down at the round table which Alice had thrown a red and white gingham blanket over to hide the imperfections in the wood. She placed down a cup of tea for herself but slid a glass and a thick bottle of whiskey Eliot’s way.

“Bless you,” he responded, uncapping the bottle with a _pop!_

“Where’s Margo?” Alice asked, eyes darting to the cane Eliot had laid across the table, a reminder of his still healing wounds. She wondered if she should ask about it or if that was too personal.

“Fillory. There’s lots of fucked shit to unfuck,” he explained vaguely, some cloudy darkness passing through his eyes. “Dark king, 300 years past, Josh and Fen missing,” he went on, downing his drink.

“I’m sorry,” Alice said, face pinched. “Why aren’t you with her?” she asked but she tripped over the words, tripped over the nerves that’d started in her chest the second she opened the door to find that Margo was not beside him.

In the time following the…

In the time following _everything_ , Margo and Eliot had been inseparable. There was a period where they’d all stayed close together, as if staying near would make everything ok when it was anything but. Margo and Eliot were always huddled close, sharing oxygen, sharing glances, sharing everything as if one could not exist without the other.

This was the result of the possession, of the Monster. This was the result of being forced to live without each other for months, the result of prolonged uncertainty.

There were few things that would drag them away from each other. Death. Or if both had shit to take care of.

Eliot finished off another drink and stared at the gingham pattern for a beat.

“I think you know why.”

Alice wanted to cry the second the words dripped from his lips. _Please_ , her eyes begged, tears trying to pry their way out. _Please, don’t do this._

Eliot dragged his eyes to hers and saw the pleading, saw that she was teetering on the edge of something powerful, something that was either devastation or demolition. He needed the latter, and so he took a chance.

He took a chance and risked that they might both crumble there at that table in that old, musty, abandoned house.

He took a chance and said it-

“Quentin.”

It sliced through the air like a knife, every syllable, every punctuation of every letter hoarding a memory, hoarding an emotion.

Each could remember every time they’d put those sounds together to form a name, every time they’d caressed it in a moment of passion, spat it in a fit of rage, curled their tongue around it in the middle of an apology.

They shriveled up, Alice squeezing her eyes shut, Eliot balling his hand into a fist so tight his nails started to bite at his palm and like a cramp had seized them, they froze until the ache started to fade and the pain to ebb so that they might have moments in between to grasp at air and breathe again.

“Why are you here, Eliot?” Alice asked again and she didn’t even try to hide her pain. In this tiny kitchen now, no time had passed, and they were back at that campfire, holding hands in solidarity, mourning a beautiful boy and the lost potential they shared. There was no ill will. There was no competition, for if there was then both had lost.

“You’re telling me you haven’t thought about it?” he questioned brusquely and he didn’t need to elaborate on the ‘it’.

“Of course I’ve- We can’t. There’s no way,” she finished more to herself than him. She’d already spent so many nights trying to accept the fact that he was gone because if she allowed herself to feel any sliver of _maybe_ , she’d never stop searching for certainty and certainty would do nothing but break her even more.

“What if I told you there was?” Eliot began. He ignored the harshness in her eyes because _of course_ she thought she was hurting more than him as if they hadn’t both felt the sweetness of the same boy’s affection. “When I was tucked away in the Monster,” he paused to let the shakiness that came with thinking of his possession pass. “I saw things, heard things. He was looking high and low for answers. And I mean _real_ high and _real_ low.”

Alice’s brows pinched together. She was inching to the edge of the cliff and once there it wouldn’t take much for her to dive over, especially if she had a partner.

“What are you saying?”

Eliot bit back a smile. It would have come out manic and tore across his face terrifyingly like bare bliss tends to do. He was getting her.

“I’m saying I’ve glimpsed pieces of Heaven and Hell. I’ve seen backdoors and shortcuts. And if it comes to it, I’ve peeked at bridges no one’s ever crossed,” he said, leaning in, passion in every word. The words sounded perfect to the ears of two very desperate, very pained Magicians.

“But maybe we won’t need to bother with it. Maybe we already have all we need. Are you listening?”

It didn’t mean ‘can you hear me’, it meant ‘stand at the edge with me’. It meant we’re at this precipice together and I _will_ jump with you.

Alice chewed her bottom lip and let sorrow slide from her face as she slipped on her hard-faced mask of endurance. In her raised brow was the woman Eliot came here looking for today.

That mouse still lingered at the back of her eyes but at the forefront now was the cold and calculated bit that Alice had locked away in the mirror world all those months ago. _She_ could handle this conversation.

Alice nudged her teacup Eliot’s way and he caught on, marring the sweet tea with the bitter taste of alcohol. Alice downed it, grimacing, a chill shuddering through her and then she drew in a breath and nodded.

“I’m listening.”

* * *

The entire place smelled like booze and sweat.

The room was awash in purple light, disco balls spinning and glittering on every surface and gyrating body in the spacious club.

Some bass heavy song was playing, the singer coercing the already half naked crowd to shed even more clothing and dance with even more reckless abandon.

Eliot and Alice stayed close together as they snaked through the bodies, declining invitations to dance and leaning away from too-close whispers.

“I think I see him,” Eliot told Alice with a jut of his chin forward, toward the corner of the room where a man sat, so pure white he glowed head to toe. Iridescent like scum under a blacklight. His arms and legs were folded, his face harsh and his hair pulled back in a tight ponytail. His stomach bulged beneath the red cloth of the dress he was wearing which, strapless, began just above his nipples and stopped just at the curve of his knee. If you approached him at the wrong angle, you’d learn very quickly he was wearing nothing underneath.

Behind the man was a tall blue door with no handle, and thorny vines growing floor to ceiling.

“Are you him?” Eliot asked over the music.

The man tilted his head, his movements slow, and looked up, blinking sleepily.

“Him you are. Me am I.”

“Oh, Jesus fuck,” Eliot groaned.

The man burst out laughing. “I’m just fucking with you! Your face!” he roared. “ _Oh, Jesus fuck_!” the man mocked, throwing his hands up the same way Eliot had.

“Ha-ha,” Eliot glared.

“We’re looking for The Tightener,” Alice cut in.

The man sobered, swiping a black tear from under his eye as he sized her up. “Oh, yeah? Is The Tightener looking for _you_?”

“No. But-”

The man stood, unfolding himself, and what looked to be a normal man sitting down turned into eight feet of fright standing. He towered over them, looking down his nose like they were nothing and no one. The folds in his alabaster skin were slits of black like he was put together by a child. Made of putty and malformed, left imperfect for sheer effectiveness of intimidation.

Eliot and Alice had the good sense to look nervous.

“You think you can just waltz in and see ‘him’ whenever you want?” the man barked, his voice lowering several octaves. “You think they have time to deal with any old Tweedle Dee and Dum that wanders by?”

Eliot and Alice froze, still processing every inch of the man and looking for the proper amount of determination to will their mouths to dole out threats when the man laughed again.

“I’m fucking with you! Go on in!” he chortled.

Eliot was ready to swing, whether his fist ricocheted and his fingers crunched or not. Alice frowned.

“There’s no knob,” she observed.

“Oh, no shit?” the man asked sarcastically and with a heavy hand, he shoved Eliot at the door. Alice reached out to grab him, her fingers finding air as Eliot disappeared through the wood as if it weren’t even there. She pressed against the door and met no resistance, felt nothing. An illusion.

“Abracadabra,” the man said before dissolving into more laughter as Alice stepped through the doorway with a roll of her eyes.

She bumped into Eliot’s back on the other side. He’d stopped still in the middle of a three-option hallway. The walls, the floors, every inch was a violet purple. The shade was so precise and consistent, it was hard to see where the corners became walls and the walls ceilings. It made the space feel off balance and dizzying. It was so disorienting, they stood close, bracing themselves on each other as they struggled to stop swaying the way their bodies wanted them to. Eliot leaned heavily on his cane.

“Left, right or center?” he asked her.

“Right?” she responded.

“Left it is.”

As it turned out, left became right and right became left, each path managing to bring them back to the ghost of a blue door.

“Center then,” Eliot began, feeling a bit sick from the journey. Center went on for ages and ages and ages still. At some point, the ceiling dipped and the two had to crouch sideways as they continued until finally, sometime later, the room widened again. They could swear they felt inclines beneath their feet as if they were traversing rolling hills and curling up and down ramps.

“I don’t like this,” Alice admitted.

“It was recommended by Pete; we should have suspected as much-”

A loud bang behind them cut through his sentence. They both turned at the noise, confusion taking over their faces as they found themselves staring at the blue door only a few feet away as if they’d just stepped into the room and not walked for twenty minutes straight, wobbling and nauseated, on the cusp of twin migraines.

“ _Hello_.”

They whipped around at the hiss of the voice. And there _she_ was, The Tightener. Lanky, thin, something snake-like about the way she carried herself. She was sat atop a throne of what appeared to be smoke. Black and billowy, it curled around her to form an elegant perch. She rested her arms on what the wisps had come together to call arm rests and, right leg crossed over left, she beckoned for them to step closer.

They obeyed though her slit eyes and blue tinted skin were anything but welcoming. She looked as if she may have been human once but had been spliced together with something _other_ to become what she was now.

“ _You want something_ ,” she spoke.

Alice cleared her throat. “A griphook.”

As much as they could, The Tightener’s eyes widened. “ _A griphook_?” The Tightener considered their request, sizing the two of them up, the desperation hitting her nose like a saccharine perfume. “ _What kind of griphook_?”

“The necromantic kind,” Eliot dropped. Again, surprise flooded the creature’s face and summoned a glimpse of a smile.

“ _I find your tenacity admirable and will oblige_ ,” The Tightener agreed. “ _Once payment is given_.”

‘Unorthodox’ was all Pete had said about The Tightener’s payment methods. Eliot had brought every penny he owned with him just in case.

“What do you need?” he asked coolly, all business.

“ _Intimacy_ ,” she responded and Alice and Eliot exchanged an uncomfortable look. “ _Your flesh does not interest me_ ,” The Tightener assured them to their relief. “ _It is your grief. Give me your happiest memory_ ,” she requested, holding out a hand.

Alice swallowed. “Give?” she questioned. “Or lend?”

The Tightener had never gotten this question before and she smiled again. “ _Lend. Though I suspect it will hurt you either way. Are you first then_?”

Alice squared her shoulders and approached the throne, offering her arm though her hand was trembling. She stared into The Tightener’s black eyes as she yanked Alice forward by her wrist and then laid a large, hot hand over her heart.

Alice gasped, a sound that immediately became a choked sob. It didn’t take long for The Tightener to empty her out, to sift through her makings until the cavern of her chest was a deep pit. Behind her lids, this is what The Tightener saw: Just a blackness and in the very center a blue light floating, flying aimlessly as if looking frantically for its friends.

With a shove on Alice’s chest, she summoned the light and it flew forward and shot through her until images danced within her, emotions flooding her as she watched and experienced Alice’s bliss. A memory several years old that drew pathetic noises from Alice.

The Tightener’s presence magnified the pain, the melancholy, the happiness, the pleasure of the moment until Alice was in such agony she could hardly stand.

Eliot watched, wondering if he should step in to steady her shaking shoulders, if not for Alice’s sake then for his own. It was torturous to watch, torturous to hear the anguish in her crying, terrifying to know he was next.

And then it was over.

The Tightener let go abruptly and Alice nearly fell.

She forced her legs to solidify again. They were unsteady and weak and barely carried her back to Eliot’s side. He placed a tentative hand on her shoulder to find she was burning hot.

“Fuck. Are you okay?”

Alice nodded, her eyes to the ground, a hiccupped last sob fighting through.

“ _Come_ ,” The Tightener called and hesitantly, Eliot obeyed. He wished he’d grabbed a drink at the bar before coming in.

Again, The Tightener snatched the proffered hand and roughly began a second siphoning of joy. Eliot’s memory was fresher, detailed and busy, his bright orange light calling to The Tightener. While Alice’s memory had fallen over The Tightener, soaking into her skin, a reflection of the quiet scene, tame and unoffending, Eliot’s memory wrapped itself around her, humid and tactile.

The Tightener doubled back on an image, assessing the tanned, serene face in Eliot’s memory. She paused and picked apart the scene curiously, another wicked smile growing on her face.

Burning tears fell down Eliot’s cheeks silently, his head tilted to the ceiling and his fist closed tight. He bared his teeth against the suffering, his grip on his cane almost painful. The decoration at the top of the wood was cutting uncomfortably into his palm but he couldn’t pry his fingers loose.

The Tightener took her time letting go, always lingering on the face in Eliot’s memory. When finally she released and allowed Eliot to stumble backward, she stepped down from her throne and the seat disappeared in a puff of black smoke.

She was small as she sauntered toward them, two sniffling messes, each disoriented as their memories cycled rapidly, trying to find their place again.

The Tightener laid a tender hand on each of their faces, her voice softening. “ _From the moment you entered, I knew you ached. How strange though that you ache for the same one. What a journey you have, my loves. And what a love you’ve journeyed._ ”

Neither knew but they were one in the same at that moment, both fighting to not shed anymore tears, both fighting to stifle the memory that kept rising to the surface because living through it again would be a cut too sharp to survive. If they’d turned their heads then, watery blue would’ve met watery brown and found that sorrow in the face of sorrow can sometimes cancel out into solace, into consolation.

But their gazes were straight forward and unfocused.

“ _Close your eyes_ ,” The Tightener whispered to them and slowly, obediently, their lids fell closed. “ _And pay attention._ ”

Her words sent a cool rush of air over their faces and when they managed to drag their eyes open again, they were stood on the sidewalk in the cold midnight air, the distant bass from inside thumping to the beat of their hearts.

* * *

The griphooks were two very small gems.

One rose quartz, one emerald, each attached to the end of a very simple silver chain, Alice and Eliot wore them around their necks.

They’d tried—and failed—to remove them but they were bound and so they tucked the chains beneath their clothes and out of sight.

“ _Still alive. Still searching. Miss you._ ”

The rabbit squawked Margo’s message to Eliot as it did everyday around this time. Eliot whispered a response to the rabbit and sent it back with his reply.

Alice was busy putting wards back in place on the door. They’d just returned from a grocery run on which she’d spent most of the time glancing over her shoulder and doing so with such frequency that eventually Eliot started to do the same.

“What exactly are you hiding from?” he questioned finally as he put away what had been some very expensive bottles of alcohol and the six packs of gummy bears Alice picked up. Everyone had their vices, I guess.

“The Library,” she responded shortly. She didn’t like to think about them because Library led to Everett and Everett led to…

“You think they’re still after you?” Eliot wondered, his eyes suddenly glued to the countertop. They were both dangerously close to acknowledging the elephant in the room and they’d silently agreed not to do so beyond necessity.

“I know they are,” Alice said as she finished, flattening her hands on her dress. She rounded the corner and got to work helping him put things away. “I think they want to give me a job.”

“Oh,” Eliot paused. “Fuck. Well, but if they’re hiring you, they probably don’t want you dead-”

“You think I want to see them?” she interrupted. “Any of them? After what they did? What _he_ did…”

“So, what, you hide from them forever? Find another dust trap when they figure this one out?”

“How did you find me anyway?” Alice wondered. She thought she’d done a pretty good job cloaking herself and admittedly when she looked out the window, she was too relieved to find it was just Eliot to think further.

“It wasn’t hard. You should re-up your cloaking,” he said distractedly, searching the cabinets for a clean glass.

“On your left,” Alice directed but her mind was still on his response. What are the odds Eliot would find her before the Library could? “And my wards are fine.”

“And yet…” Eliot trailed off, popping open a bottle of wine.

Alice watched him prop his feet up on the table with the type of forced nonchalance she’d known him to execute when he felt anything but nonchalant. She started shelving some of their canned goods, her face pinched up.

“I didn’t know we were going to be hiding things. I thought doing this meant-”

Eliot very pointedly slammed a book down on the table, cutting her off. “Let’s go over this one last time,” he suggested, fanning away dust from the pages. Alice sat down and watched his fingers navigate to page 394 and read upside down the words ‘Living Clay’ at the start of the chapter she’d reviewed a million times over the past few days. She pulled a folded-up sheet of paper from her pocket and smoothed it flat on the table.

It was a printout from a website that’d took them days to access and decode, but once they did they found a trove of dark magic and theorywork, secrets and ideas long since forgotten, like griphooks and snake women who granted wishes for a price.

Alice and Eliot talked through the plan unemotionally, like two business partners discussing something that they’d long ago lost passion for. But really, they were both practically vibrating with anticipation, even as the darkness within them grew deeper, even as something inside of them was scraping doubt into their flesh. 

“And so, the griphook will extend the duration of one powerful spell. It should hold long enough for us to bind the energy to the clay. Permanently. Hopefully,” Alice added.

“Good,” Eliot sighed, taking a drink. “And then we wait for the other shoe.”

“What do you mean?”

“We get _two_ superjuice gems to do a _necromancy_ spell… The other shoe that drops from this is going to be catastrophic.”

“We’ll handle it,” Alice said after a beat, chewing on her lip. “Even if we’re putting our faith in Pete and old forums.” Her eyes danced over the words on the page, not soaking in a single thing. “Are you having second thoughts?” she brought herself to ask. Between the words, another question waited.

_Do you want to stop now and do this the old-fashioned way? The painful way? Do you want to put a band-aid on the gaping wound we’re both bleeding from and hope it closes someday?_

Wasn’t that what people did? Just wait for the wound to close? Try to have the patience to let it do what every wound does?

Or was everyone like Eliot and Alice, picking at it to remember it existed?

Every night picking at it and picking at it because it doesn’t matter if you irritate it. It will take forever to heal either way. And maybe you don’t want it to. Maybe the idea of closing a wound, of losing a wound, the finality of letting go is a thought too permanent to bear. Because how can a thing so powerful ever be glazed over? How can it ever not hurt, strong as it is? Doesn’t it deserve to mar and ache and irritate? Doesn’t it deserve to fester, red and raw, an unavoidable beacon reminding you of what you lost? Healing felt like forgetting and forgetting was an insult to _him_.

They’d rather ache instead.

“No,” Eliot answered. “I’m not.”

* * *

“We’re lost.”

Alice dug her nails into the dirt and heaved herself higher up the steep hill, thankful she’d worn pants today.

“We’re not lost,” she told Eliot. He was a few feet below her, carefully choosing which rocks to use in his ascent. The heavy bags on their backs were making the journey that much more difficult. “We’re almost there. I saw it on my way into town,” she continued. “Just trust me.”

“Trust you?” he said before he could stop himself. “You understand why I might struggle?”

Alice pressed her eyes shut and drew in a breath, ignoring his words. She scraped her hand pulling herself up and onto the cliff.

It was pitch black save for the blue illumination offered by the midnight moon. Its light shone over the patchy green grass covering the small area. There were no animals to be seen but birds chirped noisily from atop the branches of the sparse tanoak trees nearby. Alice looked out at the view, blinking lights in far off houses and distant city life looking back at her.

Eliot grunted and she turned back, squatting to offer him a hand. He took it, letting her help him make a much more graceful landing than she had.

“Thanks,” he said.

“Look.” Alice pointed to the cluster of trees on their left. They were the precise tanoak evergreens they’d come looking for. Susceptible to sudden death, many of the trees were leaning and browning already. Alice and Eliot both plucked a sharp-toothed leaf from one still green and thriving.

“This is it?” Eliot questioned, running a delicate finger over the leaf’s rubbery surface.

“Yes. I told you.” Alice slid her bag off, taking out a heavy mound of clay and a small mortar and pestle. Eliot’s bag housed much the same. “I’ll do the leaves,” Alice said, holding out a hand for him to give his up.

Eliot obeyed, not trusting his mouth. There was a buzz in the air now. If he were braver, he’d outwardly call it anticipation. They were close. This was the beginning of the end.

Before the sun rose over this clearing, _he_ might be back.

There was an or to be considered, but ors were quiet whispers in the face of screaming desperation.

For a time, they worked silently beside each other, Alice grinding the leaves down into a fine powder and Eliot splaying out the clay and molding it into an amorphous blob that would soon become a man.

With his index finger, Eliot poked a hole where a mouth might be and Alice let the green dust of the leaves fall into it.

The clay lit up, brilliant white light taking over it as it stretched and uncurled, feet and legs taking shape, the small Eliot-made hole transforming into an unfamiliar mouth. It wasn’t him yet but for all the relief that flooded over Eliot and Alice’s faces, you’d think it was.

“Holy shit,” Eliot marveled. “It’s working.”

Alice nearly cracked a smile before their eyes met and they remembered what happened next.

“You ready to become best friends?” Eliot asked sardonically. The body had no ties to him yet. They would need to create the shadow that lives within everybody.

They would have to piece together some semblance of a soul. And who better than the two people he’d bared it to?

If they painted a good enough picture, the necromancy spell would be able to find him wherever he was and bring him forth. They were the needle of the spell’s compass and _he_ would be the true North.

Eliot and Alice joined hands over the clay.

They locked eyes, breathed deeply in unison and then, with a nod, they both began chanting in a forgotten language, their voices guttural and quick, the words rushing out with a sort of trepidatious excitement, like kids chanting for Bloody Mary in a mirror. A _please_ and a _don’t_ in every syllable.

There was nothing, a long stretch of nothing as they finished.

And then there was everything.

Alice and Eliot took in twin gasps, the grip on each other’s hands growing tighter as their eyes rolled back and their heads tilted to the heavens, the magic snatching them under.

* * *

Alice blinked as soon as her eyes told her she could. And when her lids opened, she closed them again immediately because she was stood in a field so bright, it hurt her eyes to see. It hurt to take in the lush green grass and baby pink sky full of thick white clouds.

She squinted, eyes watering and as she brought a hand up to shield her face, two feet appeared in front of her. But as her eyes rose to find a face, Alice was jerked away and thrown so hard against a mattress, she bounced, the springs groaning.

“What, I- Eliot!” she managed to call out before the room painted itself in, the sheets filled in a familiar lilac and approaching footsteps made the floorboards creak.

“That’s a concerning sound.”

Alice shot up in bed, a gasp tripping out of her along with half a sob as Quentin walked through the door, two mugs in hand. Her heart thundered against her chest, words lost as he kicked the door shut. His hair flopped in his face, his brows pinched with concentration as he carefully padded over. Alice wanted to brush it back to see his eyes.

“You said Eliot’s name. Should I be worried?” he smiled, setting the mugs down on her bedside table and leaning in for a kiss. He paused seeing her face. “What’s wrong? Vix?”

This time she did cry. _Vix_. When he cupped her face and made her raise her eyes to his, she cried even harder and gripped at his wrist tightly. She felt the sparse hair on his skin, the thump of his pulse.

“What did I do?” he asked anxiously, about to pull his hands away for fear he was crossing some line.

“No,” Alice said, holding him. “Nothing. I’m fine. I’m fine.”

“You don’t look fine.” Slowly, he climbed into bed next to her.

“I’m just happy,” she lied, wiping her face. The tears were clouding her vision and she needed them gone, so she could drink him in, all of him.

“I’m happy too, Vix. Actually…”

Nerves made his eyes find his lap and he braided their fingers together gingerly. Alice’d lived in this minute once before and still when he looked at her, her breath caught in her throat just like the first time.

Because there it was in his eyes.

He’d said the words to her before, and she didn’t take it for granted but there was something that kept it from soaking into her. Some brick wall in her chest convincing her she didn’t deserve it, he hadn’t meant it.

But in this moment, he hadn’t even said it. He looked at her and she _felt_ it. She saw it. She believed it.

He was in love with her.

“I love you, Quentin.”

His brows pinched and fluttered the way they always did when he was thinking on something, and bliss and surprised took over his face, making him near breathless with joy.

“I love you, too, Alice.”

She remembered the cadence of his words so well, she mouthed them along with him. She’d lived in this moment a thousand times before and knew just how the warmness of his affection would settle in her chest. And it didn’t disappoint, wrapping her in a security and safeness she’d yearned to feel her entire life and had only found with him.

Every person and every thing in her life that made her feel broken faded away because someone saw her as whole. Someone said she was enough and felt enough in her presence, someone felt less alone with her there, someone she needed needed her back. Someone she loved loved her back.

Being Quentin felt like dreaming; fragile and perfect and possible.

Together they settled against the headboard, Quentin bringing Alice to rest on his chest as they breathed in the company of each other and let the world be nothing but this bed for a moment.

“I love you,” he repeated, and she nuzzled into his shirt, wondering how long she could stay. “But you know how this ends, don’t you?”

Alice started, her smile waning. This was new. This was not right.

“What are you talking about?” She tried to sit up but he held tight even as she struggled against the arm her had around her. “Quentin?”

“Shh,” he hushed her, stroked her hair delicately. “I just want to ask you something.” Alice tried to cast but her fingers were stiff. “Do you think you’ll ever forgive yourself?” Alice wanted to pry him off but every time she touched him, she slipped right through like he wasn’t even there. “For how you treated me?”

Alice froze. “Quentin-”

“Sometimes I envied Charlie. At least you gave up on him. But with me, you nag and you nag. When you’re ready, when you’re not ready. Even in death, I get no peace from you.”

He pressed his lips to her ear so she could hear the angry breath of his words. “You know I’m proud of you for finally starting to get your shit together,” he complimented. “Too bad it’s too late. Too bad I died in love with your shadow.”

Alice kicked helplessly against the sheets, fighting around his hold to press her hands to her ears. “Stop!”

“Because you don’t actually think I loved _you_ , did you? You ungrateful ghost of a fantasy,” he spat and finally released her.

Alice jumped away, skittering out of bed so fast she fell to the floor. As she picked herself up, the room started fading, all color dripping away as Quentin stood glaring at her on the other side of the bed.

“Maybe I loved you then. Now,” he amended, pointing around her Brakebills room. “I’ll give you that much. I loved you before things got complicated. Before I better options,” he went on. Alice backed against the wall as he advanced, stepping through and not around the bed. “Before I had _him_.”

Quentin moved impossibly closer but just before he could touch her again, she fell back, slipping through the wall and into a new portrait. Her bedroom at home with the two of them embracing, Quentin running to her outside the Plover House, blue light filtering over them as they lay together in bed at Brakebills South. Over and over she fell. Past a broken coffee cup on a table, the air thick with hesitance and chance, the air thick with possibility. Past a room with a single mirror, the sound of her screams echoing in her ears…

“Alice…” Quentin called and she was dragged to her feet, his hand holding her shoulder tight. She fought to see him through the wetness fighting to fall.

“I’m sorry. I loved you every day. Please. I’m sorry,” she said pathetically, her grip on him loosening to a weak hold as she gave up. Quentin froze, his eyes wide and confused.

A bright light started beneath his shirt, growing brighter the longer the two stayed watching. It bloomed, making the air hot. His hold on Alice grew lighter and the dangerous feeling of hope started in her chest as he lifted his eyes to hers.

His face was gentler, bewildered, his hair in his eyes. “Alice?”

She swallowed the lump in her throat. “Quentin?”

The light exploded and launched Alice back before he could answer. She flew and flew, her eyes pinched closed against the pressure until she landed hard in lush green grass underneath a baby pink sky full of thick white clouds.

* * *

Eliot blinked as soon as his eyes told him he could. And when his lids opened, he closed them again immediately because he was stood in a field so bright, it hurt his eyes to see. It hurt to take in the lush green grass and baby pink sky full of thick white clouds.

He squinted, eyes watering and as he brought a hand up to shield his face, two feet appeared in front of him. But as his eyes rose to find a face, Eliot was jerked away and thrown hard against a wooden door, his spine connecting with the frame.

“Fuck,” he groaned, rubbing at his skin as the setting painted itself in; a clearing of grass, flowers sprouting through the rough dirt, approaching footsteps making the earth crunch.

“Good morning. You slept late.”

Eliot tripped backward, gripping the doorknob for support as Quentin rounded the corner of the house smiling, his hair pulled back in a bun. “Holy shit,” Eliot mumbled, mesmerizing by the living memory, the way the sunlight threw golden shadows across Quentin’s face.

Eliot’s hand curled into a fist to keep himself from reaching out to stroke at his skin, to let Quentin’s hair sift through his fingers one final time.

“You ok?” Quentin asked and Eliot nodded, even while his insides were curled with nerves and disbelief.

It hadn’t been so long since Eliot requested they not dwell on the kiss they shared that night, but now all Eliot could think of was grabbing Quentin and pressing their mouths together, so he could confirm that it really did feel the way he remembered, that they were really everything he recalled they were. So he could figure out if they really were electric, or if he’d just convinced himself they were.

Quentin tucked a wayward strand behind his ear and wet his lips with that frantic, fidgety nature Eliot always loved. “Okay, so I think I may have thought of a way to do…this,” he gestured to the mosaic. “Quicker. Or at least in a way that won’t drive us crazy before we’re done.”

“Okay,” Eliot said stiltedly, still frozen. “Yea. Okay.”

“I, uh, I tracked down the Fillorian equivalent to coffee and had two sips and didn’t die, so that’s on the table if you wanted to live a little. Doesn’t really wake you up but does taste vaguely of vanilla and…dirt.”

Eliot laughed and, unable to resist anymore, brushed a hand over Quentin’s shoulder and squeezed. He was _real_. “Thank you.” And he may have looked at Quentin with a bit too much honesty because Quentin paused, and they stared at each other, unblinking, for a long moment while birds chirped around them and a gentle breeze blew their hair.

And they watched each other with the open thirst they’d become accustomed to, starved for each other—each other’s company, each other’s touch, each other’s existence. They didn’t know whether they wanted to embrace or kiss, they just knew they _wanted_.

“We should probably get started,” Eliot suggested, breaking the moment.

Quentin blinked, wiping his hands on his pants and looking over at the mosaic with a sigh. “Yea. Key. Fate of the world,” he reminded himself. “No big deal.”

Quentin started away but stalled, turning back. “Hey. This is working,” he said abruptly. “Us. Here,” Quentin clarified, looking around. “It could work. And yea, I know. If and when,” he said less enthusiastically. “But in the meantime…we work.”

Quentin reached for Eliot’s hand without hesitation and threaded their fingers, smiling timidly up at him.

Eliot always hated that he heard ‘meantime’ first and took longer to see the hopefulness in Quentin’s eyes, but once he did, he was lost to the ‘meantime’. Lost to the idea that until further notice, _he_ had him. And they were here, in their own slice of simplicity, and Quentin was looking at him like he was someone big, and suddenly meantime was more than enough.

This was his moment. The first moment they felt like an Us.

“Yea,” Eliot agreed, squeezing Quentin’s fingers. “We work.” Eliot was still smiling as Quentin turned to start marking the configuration on the mosaic.

“I wouldn’t get so used to it, though,” Quentin began as he scribbled.

“What?” Eliot walked over to drape an arm across Quentin’s shoulders, frowning as he pulled away.

“I said I wouldn’t get so used to us working,” Quentin explained. “When this ends, you know, and I stop being trapped here with you and go home to the person I’d rather be with, then we can just forget this all happened.”

Eliot made a face and slipped further away, looking around and above, like he thought the other shoe was a physical thing, coming to crush him flat. “Right,” he managed. “Yea, of course.”

Quentin paused to look at Eliot’s face. “Wait- you didn’t think I meant I’d stay here forever…with _you_?” he questioned. “You think I want you here? Out of everyone else it could be? Out of Alice?”

Eliot took a step back, knowing this wasn’t real but feeling the sound of Quentin’s voice regurgitating his deepest insecurities break him with every syllable.

“You’re just a thing of convenience,” Quentin said, advancing on him. “Second best. What use would I have with a coward?” he spit. “You had me and you couldn’t even seal the deal. So up your own ass, you couldn’t let yourself be happy. And now, where am I? Gone. And you never even had me.”

“Jesus,” Eliot stuttered as Quentin jumped at him and he fell, crawling backward on his hands and knees as Quentin continued to stalk closer, his face full of pure hatred. He grabbed for Eliot’s shirt, fisting it as he drew him close, his nose pressed into Eliot’s cheek as he turned away.

“Coward,” Quentin repeated. “You couldn’t even say it to my face. Say it now,” he demanded. “Coward! Say it.”

And just to quiet the voice, Eliot choked out words that ached his throat to say. “I love you.”

The fingers gripping his shirt, the nails that’d begun to tear through to his skin loosened and he braved a glance at his tormentor, his friend, his lover. Quentin had frozen, his eyes wide and confused.

A bright light started beneath his shirt, growing brighter the longer the two stayed watching. It bloomed, making the air hot. His hold on Eliot grew lighter and the dangerous feeling of hope started in his chest as he lifted his eyes to Quentin’s.

“I love you,” Eliot repeated to eyes much more familiar and gentler and he felt something in his chest release, some balm smooth itself over the wound left behind by an unfinished story. “I should have told you. I love you.”

Quentin’s head tilted, a whisper of a smile on his lips as they parted. “Eliot?”

Ready to burn to feel him again, Eliot leaned closer through the blinding light, yearning to press their mouths together.

But the light exploded and launched Eliot back before he could. He flew and flew, his eyes pinched closed against the pressure until he landed hard in lush green grass underneath a baby pink sky full of thick white clouds.

* * *

The light took form in the distance for Alice and Eliot, melting into the shape of a girl and boy, running at each other.

“Eliot!” Alice said as they nearly collided.

“Alice, thank fuck,” Eliot breathed as the two gripped on to each other’s arms like they were terrified another moment might make them both a memory as well.

Alice panted. “Did you see-”

“Shadow Q with a very bad attitude? Yea, I did,” Eliot interrupted. “How the fuck do we get out of here?”

“I don’t know,” Alice said. “We have to…open our eyes.”

“Detailed instruction, thanks.”

A loud swishing noise ripped through the air, startling Alice and Eliot, drawing their attention to the rose-colored streak of light-headed their way at an alarmingly fast speed.

“Do we run?” Eliot questioned.

“It’s never usually a good idea to go toward the light so, yea? Maybe?” Alice responded hesitantly, and more by accident than with purpose, the two locked hands and took off ahead of the light, their feet stuttering in the grass.

The faster they ran, the more the light gained speed and the more damp the grass grew until they were slipping with every step, their ankles splattered with mud. The sky opened up and released sharp droplets of rain upon them, casting darkness until the light chasing them was the only brightness to be found.

“Is this my Hell Q or yours?” Eliot wondered, looking over his shoulder at the fast gaining wisp.

“Mine,” Alice answered, sputtered. Her hair whipped across her face as she abruptly stopped running, nearly dragging Eliot to the ground. “ _That_ one’s yours.”

Together, they watched an emerald light come barreling from the opposite direction, too fast to dodge, and soon they couldn’t decide which to focus on, their heads sweeping back and forth, their chests rising and falling quickly.

“What happens when they get here?” Eliot asked.

“I don’t know,” Alice said. “But this was a bad idea.”

“No, really?” Eliot responded dryly. “Astute observation.”

Alice frowned at his tone. “This was your idea,” she reminded him. “ _You_ found _me_. Somehow. I was…coping. _You_ found _me_!”

Eliot made a sour face. “You were shacked up in a dead woman’s house, peeking out the curtains and living off canned foods. Your version of coping looks a lot like hermiting.”

“We can’t all fix things with alcohol and sarcasm,” Alice retorted.

“Alcohol and sarcasm,” Eliot said holding up a hand. “Hermiting and solitude,” he finished, waving his hands back and forth as if weighing the options. Alice rolled her eyes. “You don’t have the monopoly on suffering, Alice.”

“What-”

“You’re not the only one dealing with this.”

“When did I say that?” she yelled, stepping closer. “When did I ever say that? You think I don’t know he loved you?” she asked, her voice weakening.

“No,” Eliot sneered. “I know you know. I just think you believe you two were better,” he said, pushing damp curls from his face. “Which is ridiculous considering half your relationship was at each other’s throats.”

Alice flinched and took a half step back, the venom leaving her eyes as her heart took over and thumped in her chest pathetically, dark thoughts she’d spent months choking down coming back in one fell swoop.

“I was fixing it,” she said miserably, voicing breaking on the thought.

Alice could remember every moment she spent with Quentin, every second she cherished, every second she wasted, every memory she tainted. Every opportunity she missed to be with him. They played on loop constantly in her head, not just after he died, but every day before.

Because Alice knew how it felt to be loved by Quentin Coldwater, she knew the look in his eyes, the curve of his smile, the tilt of his head when he saw you, all of you, and embraced it with everything he was. She knew how it made her feel, how it wrapped around her and melted into her bones, filled her with a warmth she’d never felt before or since; how it made her feel hope and fear and excitement and wonder. And she knew that at some point she lost it, at some point he gave it away to someone else. Whether fully or partially, it was no longer hers anymore.

He was no longer hers.

And it wasn’t because she didn’t love Quentin, it was because she wouldn’t let him love her back.

“You were fixing it,” Eliot repeated snarkily, “Right.”

The dam in Alice’s chest broke at Eliot doing to her what she’d been doing to herself for far too long and she shot him an icy, condescending look.

“What about you?” she questioned. “Wasn’t half your relationship rooted in tragedy? Did you ever manage being together when the world _wasn’t_ ending?”

It was Eliot’s turn to blanch, his own insecurities being voiced aloud by the one person he didn’t need it from. How many times had he drove himself insane, recounting details of his time with Quentin and finding the same thread in each? _If_.

How many times had he doubted the strength of his and Quentin’s love because it always seemed contingent on ifs and buts and circumstances? He felt like an afterthought, the one Quentin had feelings for but never meant to. The one he stumbled upon while he was busy loving someone else.

He felt like the bridge between Quentin and Alice, the lull while Quentin remembered what he really wanted. So when Quentin offered himself up to Eliot, it was less hard than it should have been to say no.

And it wasn’t because he didn’t love Quentin, it was because he wouldn’t let him love him back.

“Eliot!” Alice screeched, drawing him from his thoughts but not in time for him to avoid the light that struck his back and shoved him to his knees. Alice’s memory drove through Eliot like a knife, splitting him in half as he struggled, grunting, before falling limp into the mud.

“Eliot!” Alice tried again, kneeling to sweep curls off his face and reveal a relaxed expression, his eyes closed, his lashes resting against his cheeks. “Eliot? Ar-”

Emerald brilliance sliced through Alice, piercing her shoulder blade and coming out through her heart, immobilizing her until she was a twin stillness on the ground beside Eliot. She writhed until she didn’t; until her muscles relaxed and she joined Eliot in calmness.

Behind their lids, soft smiles played. Lilac sheets, the tight warmth of first love, the smell of cedar wood and second chances, quick hands and calming thoughts.

The curve of one boy’s smile, the tilt of his head, the look in his eyes, a slice of simplicity, the forever in a ‘meantime’.

They felt him, and all he was for each of them. They saw him through each other’s eyes, felt the way it felt to be wanted by him, to be held by him, to feel inadequate and undeserving, to feel less than in the shadow of each other.

They felt the love of Quentin Coldwater, how similar and strikingly different it fit on both of them, how beautifully they both wore it once, how beautifully they both still felt inside it.

Their eyes opened, gasps choking the both of them as they startled back to life. Their hands grazed in the mud as they collected themselves and they paused, finding each other’s eyes and staring, like they’d never seen before, like they’d never met. And maybe they truly hadn’t.

“I felt…” Alice started.

Eliot nodded. “I know.”

Alice’s face pinched up with unshed tears. “He-”

Her thought was stolen as a light washed over them both, making them shield their eyes and squint to focus on the luminance.

It spit out a silhouette, a boy, half shrouded in emerald green, half in rose, his face familiar and foreign all at the same time.

“Quentin,” Alice and Eliot said together. And as they reached for him, he knelt, his face so bright they could hardly see the smile. Their palms connected with his cheeks and they felt the heat burning there, scalding them, welding their skin to his.

They grimaced, and when they opened their eyes again, they were in a clearing, surrounded by tanoak evergreens, tightly holding hands.

The mound of clay had settled back into an amorphous blob of nothing, and the sky was pouring rain. It was still, no one but the crickets around to witness the two magicians fighting for breath and fighting back tears.

They gathered themselves, not noticing the way their fingers tightened around each other’s as they did, every squeeze asking for something the next grip gave. No one spoke for a long while and when they did, their voice was so weak, they had to clear their throat and start again.

“I did the spell,” Eliot started. “The spell to tell me where to go, where I’m needed.” Alice’s brows pulled together, realization dawning on her face. “It brought me to your doorstep. I stood outside for an hour before I knocked.”

“Oh,” Alice whispered. “So, when you said you had a plan-”

“I didn’t have a plan. I had Pete’s number, ideas and a shitload of desperation,” Eliot confessed.

“Seems like that’s going around,” Alice tried to joke, though her face was flat. She and Eliot remembered the clay at the same time, the mouth still open and waiting. They grabbed for the stones around their necks and held the jagged rocks firmly.

They held him, the last of him firmly.

“Close your eyes,” Alice began quietly, The Tightener’s voice in her head. “And pay attention.”

Alice’s eyes found Eliot’s, found the twin realization there, morphing into wonder as their stones began to glow.

* * *

Twenty minutes outside Modesto, California is the city of Turlock.

Somewhere near the edge of Turlock, at a small, creaky old house, Eliot Waugh and Alice Quinn closed a worn wooden door and crunched down the cobblestone sidewalk.

Neither looked particularly pleased as they walked side by side, because they weren’t going back to dreams and memories, they were going back to life.

But as they continued down the path, two stones around their necks, and a hundred more memories and reasons in their hearts, they thought, for a moment, that maybe that wouldn’t be so bad.

**Author's Note:**

> I started this in April of last year and took forever to finish it. If we don't get Alice and Eliot besties in canon, then what even is the point? Thanks for reading! Hope you enjoyed.


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